Icy Claim that
Water has Memory

LIONEL MILGROM /
New Scientist 11jun03

Claims do not come much more controversial than the idea that water might
retain a memory of substances once dissolved in it. The notion is central to
homeopathy, which treats patients with samples so dilute they are unlikely to
contain a single molecule of the active compound, but it is generally ridiculed
by scientists.

Holding such a heretical view famously cost one of France's top allergy
researchers, Jacques Benveniste, his funding, labs and reputation after his
findings were discredited in 1988.

Yet a paper is about to be published in the reputable journal Physica A
claiming to show that even though they should be identical, the structure of
hydrogen bonds in pure water is very different from that in homeopathic
dilutions of salt solutions. Could it be time to take the "memory" of
water seriously?

The paper's author, Swiss chemist Louis Rey, is using thermoluminescence to
study the structure of solids. The technique involves bathing a chilled sample
with radiation. When the sample is warmed up, the stored energy is released as
light in a pattern that reflects the atomic structure of the sample.

When Rey used the method on ice he saw two peaks of light, at temperatures of
around 120 K and 170 K. Rey wanted to test the idea, suggested by other
researchers, that the 170 K peak reflects the pattern of hydrogen bonds within
the ice. In his experiments he used heavy water (which contains the heavy
hydrogen isotope deuterium), because it has stronger hydrogen bonds than normal
water.

Unexplained results

After studying pure samples, Rey looked at solutions of lithium chloride and
sodium chloride. Lithium chloride destroys hydrogen bonds, as does sodium
chloride, but to a lesser extent. Sure enough, the peak was smaller for a
solution of sodium chloride, and disappeared completely for a lithium chloride
solution.

Aware of homeopaths' claims that patterns of hydrogen bonds can survive
successive dilutions, Rey decided to test samples that had been diluted down to
a notional 10-30 grams per cubic centimetre - way beyond the point when any ions
of the original substance could remain. "We thought it would be of interest
to challenge the theory," he says.

Each dilution was made according to a strict protocol, and vigorously stirred
at each stage, as homeopaths do. When Rey compared the ultra-dilute lithium and
sodium chloride solutions with pure water that had been through the same
process, the difference in their thermoluminescence peaks compared with pure
water was still there (see graph).

"Much to our surprise, the thermoluminescence glows of the three systems
were substantially different," he says. He believes the result proves that
the networks of hydrogen bonds in the samples were different.

Phase transition

Martin Chaplin from London's South Bank University, an expert on water and
hydrogen bonding, is not so sure. "Rey's rationale for water memory seems
most unlikely," he says. "Most hydrogen bonding in liquid water
rearranges when it freezes."

He points out that the two thermoluminescence peaks Rey observed occur around
the temperatures where ice is known to undergo transitions between different
phases. He suggests that tiny amounts of impurities in the samples, perhaps due
to inefficient mixing, could be getting concentrated at the boundaries between
different phases in the ice and causing the changes in thermoluminescence.

But thermoluminescence expert Raphael Visocekas from the Denis Diderot
University of Paris, who watched Rey carry out some of his experiments, says he
is convinced. "The experiments showed a very nice reproducibility," he
told New Scientist. "It is trustworthy physics." He see no reason why
patterns of hydrogen bonds in the liquid samples should not survive freezing and
affect the molecular arrangement of the ice.

After his own experience, Benveniste advises caution. "This is
interesting work, but Rey's experiments were not blinded and although he says
the work is reproducible, he doesn't say how many experiments he did," he
says. "As I know to my cost, this is such a controversial field, it is
mandatory to be as foolproof as possible."

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